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Comment by Uehreka | Hacker News Reader

There definitely is such a thing as bad publicity, I wish people would stop using that phrase to make dumb things sound smart. Of all the companies out there, Apple definitely doesn’t want to trade on negative sentiment, it clashes with their overall brand strategy. In particular this iPad Pro launch is riskier than normal, given that it has brand new screen tech and is the thinnest device they’ve ever made, and it’s possible they pulled this commercial to avoid creating associations between this iPad and the act of “crushing” things.

Furthermore I doubt that anyone on HN (except like 2 people who will definitely reply to this comment) who didn’t know about the new iPad Pro before this commericial learned about it from this post.

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Allow me to be the first of the two to announce themselves.

I agree, though. Although I only learned of the product because of the outrage over the ad, it certainly hasn't moved me toward wanting to purchase one. And I'll actually be in the market for a tablet in a few months.

#2 checking in. I pay almost zero attention to what Apple does. I'll pay attention if they start allowing Mozilla to ship add-ons with Firefox so I can run adblock on mobile like on Firefox!

You can run ad-blockers on iOS Safari (they're called "Content Blockers", I use Firefox Focus's) granted you're still stuck with Safari/WebKit for the time being.

And although it's not Firefox, the Orion browser from Kagi supports Chrome and Firefox add-ons on iOS.

That's interesting! Does it work well, e.g. on YouTube ads?

#3 of a vast number: I don't pay attention to what Apple does, choose not to own any Apple products even though I do respect their technology, particularly Apple Silicon; would not have been aware of a launch of a new iPad if it weren't for this controversy.

Yep, I had considered getting an iPad. I probably wouldn't have, this doesn't prevent me bur it is a point in another directiom. Things like the Minis Forum V3 give me more options and the company knows "how to read the room".

>There definitely is such a thing as bad publicity, I wish people would stop using that phrase

the phrase "there's no such thing as bad PR" is meant to make you realize that there's more to PR than you... realize. It's in the style of something like a Buddhist koan. it's not meant to be taken literally or to an extreme. It's not a proof but it does describe a real phenomenon. You can't reject the phrase without rejecting its wisdom.

I hope, on that hill, you don't die as you plan to. Because you are very literal, aren't you.

Exactly. This saying is much like Confucius famous sayings in that you have to think it through, trying it both literally and symbolically, and move several steps forward logically to try and understand the wisdom it is conveying.

It's not saying literally that no publicity can ever be bad. That's obviously not true and is easily disproven nearly every single day by current events. It's a broader conveyance of truth regarding the difficulty of getting noticed in a world crowded with content. Even if it's "bad publicity" there are still benefits of becoming more well known, for example. Apple is one of the few companies where that probably won't help, but it doesn't "disprove" the saying and mean we should reject it.

I don't understand what you are responding to. The GP comment never said anything about "dying on a hill" or being overly literal. They weren't making some grand pronouncement that there's no wisdom behind the "there's no such thing as bad PR" saying. They just pointed out that in this specific case that the bad PR is most definitely undesired and not a net benefit, and that the "no such thing as bad PR" phrase is often overused in places where it's not warranted as a sort of lazy "sure, this is fine!" explanation.

one of his other comments did say it was a hill he was going to die on, which is "a saying", as "there's no such thing as bad PR" is a saying.

My issue is that people take the idea that “bad PR” can actually be good for a company (which is common knowledge these days) and just stop there. They don’t go a step further and contemplate where the phrase applies, where it doesn’t, and what makes those situations different. They just bend over backwards and try to figure out the way it applies in every situation (even if in reality, it doesn’t). It’s that line of thinking that I find annoying.

I think the phrase has outlived its usefulness. Nowadays when I see it used it’s often in exactly the kind of extreme or overly literal way you yourself criticize.

“Is there such a thing as Bad Publicity” would make for a good freakanomics podcast episode.

My 2c: when that addage was first coined, public outrage was much harder to mobilize.

Social media and globalization work hand in hand to make it easier for people to have an outsized impact.

Two recent instances I can think of: Budweiser and US campus protests regarding the war in Gaza.

The budweiser thing should dispel the phrase once and for all. They lost over a billion in sales apparently

I feel like it’s pretty easy to disprove. I mentioned Humane AI in another comment, so here I’ll use a different and more flamboyant example: the 2019 movie Cats.

After putting $85-110M into the production of the movie, Universal released a trailer that went super viral and had every person on the internet talking about how terrible it looked. When the movie actually came out there was a second viral wave of gawking. Did this drive tons of people to the theater so they revel in the movie’s epic badness for themselves? No, the movie (which had over a dozen stars and was based on a hit musical that is popular around the world) failed to make back its budget at the box office. For reference (in case someone tries to pull the “maybe it would’ve made less money without the negative publicity” card) Tom Hooper’s previous movie musical Les Miserables earned $442M on a $61M budget.

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cats_(2019_film)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Mis%C3%A9rables_(2012_film...

The fat lady has not sung yet - terrible movies often become cult hits once they are "rediscovered" for their badness and prices go down. I wouldn't be surprised if Cats eventually became a streaming staple.

I expect the majority of people really aren't bothered about this though - just a vocal minority, so although maybe a bad ad for some, I expect the benefits of the publicity of this ad far outweight the downsides.

I wouldn't have paid any attention to a new iPad launch or known that it was the thinnest one yet, without this 'bad' press.

If anything, I'd say I'd be more likely to purchase a new iPad as a result

A vocal minority of artists and creatives who are precious about the tactile and aesthetic experiences of using the tools of their trades could also be called “Apple’s target market for the iPad Pro.” So Apple would definitely need to care about the sentiments their ads engender.

The publicity might be a short term win but there is a dangerous narrative for Apple that it feeds: that they are no longer a design-obsessed company that prizes art and creativity and channels that obsession to build the best products.

Also: Products version 15 are boring and the only way it generated awareness was through bad press, not features.

Totally agree. The people saying "but now we're talking about the iPad, mission accomplished!" isn't even marketing 101 grade.

Like saying that using the color red makes people think of a stop sign, so they won't buy your product.

Bad PR works on controversial things, for example if someone wants to sell courses to become “Alpha Male”. People who are into that become suddenly aware of it.

Apple ad isn’t controversial because people react indifferent at best and very negative at worst. Everyone already knows what an ipad is.

Let's be honest here: people are going to watch the video on their iPhone, fleetingly think "well that's a weird ad, really did not like that..." and then move onto something else on their iPhone. Apple has been untouchable for many years now. Basically Trump "I can shoot a man on 5th Avenue and people will still vote for me" level

More people know about iPad released a thinner version now than before the controversy.

Mission accomplished.

There is really no such thing as bad publicity.

Number of people who will stop buying Apple products due to this Ad : ZERO

Number of people who are aware of iPad Thin due to controversy : > ZERO

A small number of people shit on Apple/Google/Meta/Amazon all the time for every little thing

Edit : HN crowd downvoting a marketing concept. I must be right!

I disagree. I own zero apple products but pretty soon I will be purchasing a tablet for the kids.

I was looking at ipads, but this ad and the comments have reminded me why I dont like putting money in Apples pockets. So I shall definitely be buying android when I buy one.

I have a lot of Apple products, but my recent work projects on Android have brought me around a bit on the Pixel line; if I had to switch to Pixel I wouldn’t be mad (though I don’t intend on doing that any time soon). With that being said, I don’t know of any Android tablets that match the iPad in terms of quality or performance, and I’ve been watching the market closely for years (I would love a tablet I can do real programming work on). What Android tablet are you looking at?

Have you tried the Pixel Tablet? I'm on the fence mainly because I have very few tablet needs and my Samsung S6 Lite has been wonderful, but I love the idea of docked mode where it becomes a Google Home. It makes it incredibly useful as both a desk companion (love getting meeting notifications and such on a screen liek that), an alarm clock, a digital photo frame, a music player, a quick way to see my doorbell camera, etc.

I like the look of Lenovo Tab P11 or P12 etc

"No such thing as bad publicity" directly implies that brand goodwill doesn't have a tangible dollar value.

This is false, not least because this is something companies declare on financial reports.

Since my argument is “there is such a thing as bad publicity and I will die on this hill”, I’m going to shift from this sloppy ad rollout to an example that I think proves my case (that bad publicity is a thing that exists) pretty definitively.

Although it no doubt produced tons of brand awareness among people who had never heard of them, I doubt that the folks at Humane AI would argue that the recent flood of bad reviews or even the backlash against the bad reviews were helpful to them in the long term. Like sure, tons of people know about them now, perhaps they even sold a pin or two to the folks who heard about them through the controversy. But there’s a good chance they may not be able to stay solvent as a company long enough to actually capitalize on their increased brand recognition.

I agree with most of your comments here, but I actually don't think the Humane AI stuff is a good example.

By all accounts, the new iPad Pro is a good, solid product. The problem is that people don't like the ad.

The problem with Humane AI is not really "bad PR", it's fundamentally bad products. Or perhaps to put it a little more generously: as has been very common of late in the tech world, the Humane AI products are technologically interesting marvels that solve literally 0 problems people actually have and are basically worse in every way compared to a smart phone.

That is, the iPad Pro's problem is really just the PR. No amount of good PR could save Humane AI's products.

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